My neighbor
I live next door to a couple who are a bit older than I am, probably in their late 50s. Apparently the guy used to own one of the very first actual nightclubs in town and is something of a legend in this regard, from what I'm told by some of the locals about my age.

However, the guy's creepy as hell.

Most days if I go into my back yard, he's either outside or emerges shortly after me. He seems to spend all of his time drinking Busch Light and hanging out with his Dalmation, and is always either talking to the dog or whistling. He makes constant noise of some variety when he's out there. My daughter says that she's come downstairs in the wee hours of the morning to get something to drink and has heard him whistling. I've heard him do it well after midnight.

He's always watching us as well. He's about my height and about twice my weight, always wears tinted aviator glasses, and will actually come around the corner of his house to watch me unload my groceries. One night he was backlit as he did so, and I swear he looked like Jason Voorhees.

His speech is always slurred, and he has a bit of a salivation problem- his lips are always wet and slack. He once admitted that on the days he works he drinks a case of beer a day, and on his days off it's twice that.

I liked the way my friend Rob put it one day- "There's something of a tool about that man."

Last night he was sitting at the end of his driveway handing out candy. He didn't do any decorating that I could see.

I think his was the scariest house on the block.

(BTW- this is the guy that I intend to build the infrasound generator for.)
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Sat 1 Nov 2008, 19:57, 1 reply)

being a Brit, I thought I had seen eccentric,
until I spent a day or two in Santa Cruz. My all time favorite has to be Robert, also known as "the pink guy". He wanders up and down the main road in santa cruz, all day, every day, dressed in pink, with pink makeup, pink hair, pink hat and a pink parasol. Always got a smile on his face and a lovely bloke to talk to. Just a bit bonkers.
(shamen Geekius Maximus, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 19:54, 1 reply)

Taxidermist
I was attending a residential week-long workshop on Circus Skills when I made friends with a batty fellow called Darryl. During a tiring juggling lesson, he told me about how he owns his own taxidermy business, based near Ormskirk. He's stuffed all kinds of creatures, from badgers to pet cats in a variety of wacky poses. He lived in quite a modest house but it had a large garden and he kept chickens, mainly for eggs, but over time they became like pets to him. One day, one of the chicks died, and by way of grief-relieving therapy he decided to stuff it and keep it as a monument to a much-loved bird. I think there may have been a virus to blame as shortly afterwards, two more of the chicks died, so he stuffed them as well.

He called me up and asked me to go and see him, and given his recent losses, I decided to be a good friend, and go and visit. When I arrived at his house I found him practising his juggling. With the stuffed chickens...

"Check this out!" he gleefully shouted, "I am perfecting my ex-hen tricks!"
(floella, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 19:53, 7 replies)

My next door neighbour accosted me recently
He knows I live on the top floor of these flats; he lives on the ground floor. He asked if I have trouble sleeping so high up, as I'm so much nearer the cameras that god uses to spy on people, explaining that that was why he found it much easier to live on the ground floor. He then told me he'd just got back off a 4 hour bus journey, after having a dream in which a voice told him to visit this church in the middle of nowhere, and walk through the church gate. So he did, then had a 4 hour bus journey back too.
( LemonEntryMyDearWatson This time, Moriarty, the hand is on the other foot, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 18:07, Reply)

crazy cat lady
we had an entrance to our car parking area/back yard that was down a narrow alley. the house directly to the left o f the alley was owned by an old lady we knew as 'crazy cat lady'
the house was montrsouly dilapidated, and FILLED with stray cats. no humans, just cats. daily, she would come and visit, bringing 2 shopping bags full of tinned cat food, go in, and come out. she always wore this weird sherlock holmes-esque deerstalker in tatty tweed, a pair of stout granny boots, and a big grey felt duffel coat. mad mop of grey hair like wire wool..
she was a freakin DEMON! she'd regularly lie in wait for us, telling us the bins we'd put out last week were 'blocking access to the house and making it look disreputable'
they were in front of the wall outside the house,, at her age i doubt she'd be vaulting in over the wall and throguh thr front window.. whyich was boarded up any how. she'd then complain about the CONTENTS of the bin... saying it smelt bad and so on..
(this was a little hypocritical.. one night we had too much rubbish for our bin after a party so i was looking for a bin to ditch a spare bag.. her bin was brim-full, and we're talking a big wheelie bin, BRIM full of cat shit and flies.) one time i came home from work, she leapt out of the ivy bush in a dark alley and started belabouring me with an ampty bag-on-wheels screaming she knew i was kicking the door and frightening her cats.. i asked when, and she said 'just now!' no amount of explaining i was still in my work clothes, out of breath, and had literally just got home would dissuade her from my assault.

i also remember her cornering me at 6am once, on ym way TO work to tell me at length how she 'knew exactly what we were up to and she was NOT going to take it lying down. when i asked her what we were up to then, she replied 'oh you'd LOVE to know'

what the fuck?
last i saw of her was when we moved out, she was standing outside the house shouting 'thomas!! thomas! oh i WISh you wouldn't always do this when we've got company! DO come in and stop being so silly'

mad as a bag of wasps in a salad spinner.
(UppityDamnPrimate LET'S OPEN THIS F*CKING PIT UP, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 18:03, 8 replies)

Run for the bus man
There's nothing like evangelical Christians.

As we only ever saw this chap either in the Tesco store where we worked, or running for the local bus, we named him Run for the Bus Man. I had many delightful encounters with him, as I had the pleasure of serving at the pleasure of the Tesco god.

- There was the time when he came up to my till, pointed at a stand of Harry Potter DVDs and shouted, 'DO YOU KNOW WHAT'S WRONG WITH THAT?'. I didn't have the presence of mind to fake a heart attack, so I had to stand for twenty minutes whilst he ranted about how Harry Potter was evil because it had nothing to do with the Old Testament.

- He'd regularly come in on Saturday mornings just to rant at the lottery queue on the evils of gambling. He stopped after someone tried to strangle him, probably proving his point perfectly.

- Two days before Christmas, I'm sitting at my till in my Santa hat, feeling a bit jolly. Run for the Bus man comes up and tells me that Jesus was born in March and that everyone is stupid for celebrating Christmas when they do. Sucked the festive spirit right out of me, within the first five minutes of spittle-spraying insanity.

- He told my friend that cancer could be cured by eating grapes.

- Clubcards are apparently the Government's way of tracking everyone's diet. I'm not sure about Nectar points, I never asked.

- He liked to make sure that all the seats on the bus were filled in a particular order, and woe betide anyone who used their own initiative - YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG!

I eventually moved away from Suffolk and haven't seen him on my visits back to my parents' house. I wonder if he overdosed on grapes or something.
(Bondvillain2k, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 17:48, 3 replies)

Crazy Harry
About 10 years ago, I both lived and worked in town and had a 20 minute stroll to work. Now and again, Girlfriend At The Time and I would see this chap we nicknamed Crazy Harry heading off to wherever - he had this wide-eyed look, just like the character in the Muppet Show that used to blow stuff up.

Imagine a John Cleese look-alike with a serious face, greying RAF moustache and the wide-eyed look. But its what he wore that really set the scene.
He wore a white overall, a reflective vest, reflective tape around his legs and arms, and to complete the ensemble - a white construction helmet.

And written over everything with a marker pen - and I mean EVERYTHING - was "cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars and cars........."

So I guess he had a thing against cars....

One time at a crossing a car had stopped with its snout just a foot or so over the stop line for the crossing.
Bad move.
It had made Harry angry.
He squared off against the car - he leaned down with hands spread out on the bonnet and glared at the driver for a good minute. Then he smashed his fist on the bonnet and stormed off.
After recovering from his initial shock, the driver got out to inspect the damage - there was none - and got a look of Harry grinning evilly with glee as he strode at full-steam down the pavement in the general direction of away......
(Sebulba continues to fight evil with evil....., Sat 1 Nov 2008, 17:44, Reply)

Birmingham
Bus
Mentalist
(Moo Lefty Drinking From His Own Udders since, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 17:03, 3 replies)

My town is absoloutely fucking riddled
We have several local 'characters' that quite easily fall into the eccentric catagory.

Here's a rundown of my favourite:

Tesco lady - Bonkers woman who isnt exactly fortunate on the physical side. Goes to Tesco and does her exercises, often in the fruit and veg isle. There used to be a video of her on the CCTV on youtube but I think it was taken off.

Charlie - Lives in a crazy house but is let out during the day to 'patrole' a stretch of road near the Shell garage in his army uniform, medals an all. Bless him.

Heroin man - Comes into my work quite often. Easily spotted due to deep blue eyeshadow ALL around his eyes and nail varnish on his lips. Also tends to sport a baby pink female handbag and/or a baby pink duffell coat. Often found stealing.


Now then, theres a conundrum. The last two are so insane its hard to pick who wins.

Mad Russell - Local bonkers man who walks dogs for a living at an alarming pace. May not seem like much but hes a local star. You can actually buy 'Mad Russ stole my dog' t-shirts off websites. I dont think it has much meaning to people who dont know him. He also has a myspace page where he claims to aspire to be like James Bond. Lovely.

Jamie the transexual - You have not met anyone in the world like this man/woman/thing. I often feel sorry for him because he gets chased by chavs but if you saw him you'd cowl away in horror. Basically this 6ft tall middle aged man walks around town with his M&S bag for life wearing oversised, very odd female skirts from charity shops. He walks around purposly attracting attention by often being rude to shop staff / asking stupid questions / being generally weird. But the wig.. The wig is the most god-awful thing you've ever seen. He trims it himself (despite the fact it doesn't grow)

The greatest thing Iv ever seen was Heroin man walk through the store I work in and start stripping in the corner and Jamie the transexual cordening him off into a circle with shopping baskets. Made my christmas!




COME TO MY TOWN! We have crazy people to look at.
(i should have joined myspace, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 16:57, Reply)

HUUUGE balls.
i was in belfast not long ago with the GF, visiting her home. we decided to try and find out if a club she used to frequent, called the Venue, was open that night (little dive-y metal club, sounded great)
we turned up at about 5pm to see if we could see a listing, or speak to someone and find out what was on.
imagine my surprise to see a cherubic little kid of about, well a generous man would say 14, i'd have said 13 at a push, standing on the step, broad daylight, in full nazi ss gear, the big round hat, the leather kneeboots, the fuckin WORKS, authentic as you like.

several hourse before the place opened, and not even on a fancy dress night.

length? i honestly don't know how he got his bollocks under the coat.
(UppityDamnPrimate LET'S OPEN THIS F*CKING PIT UP, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 16:35, 1 reply)

Woman with a hedgehog in a shoe
Walking home at 2am in historic Bath we met a woman in her 50s, she looked concerned, so we asked if she was OK.

She had a hedgehog in her shoe.

I asked if it was injured, she said no. She told us that as she approached it had curled up into a ball. This she interpreted as a cry for help. Forcing the terrified animal into her shoe was the obvious way to assist.

I said she should release it on some grass and leave it alone.
She got agitated and insisted it was asking for her help.
I got agitated and called her a mentalist.
She screamed at me, denied being a mentalist, and complained that all her children had been taken into care.

I was told off for calling her a mentalist (by my friend, who was doing a psychology and sociology degree. For some reason that made her a better judge of inappropriate language than me). She was a mentalist.
(mrdirtylegs, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 16:35, 3 replies)

Micheal the eccentric
Growing up in a pub I've met alot of eccentrics, so I'm sure I'll be posting a few of these, but I'll start with Micheal the eccentric.

Micheal's a regular at the pub, a big guy, around 6"4' in his late 50's/early 60's, with medium length curly hair, and a constant grin on his face. The first time I met him, I assumed he had a mental disorder, but I soon learned that he's one of those types that are so intelligent he seems crazy. Here are a couple of choice memories of him;

A couple of years back, I was stood in the main bar talking to one of the customers, Stuart. Mid conversation Michel bumbles in and shakes Stuarts hand, then pulls Stuart towards him, and leans towards his ear as if to whisper something in it. Rather than whispering Micheal say's (at a normal volume) "Have you been eating mmmmelons?"
"Er no, Micheal mate I've not"
At which point micheal pulls back, straigtens up and says matter of factually, "Oh, must just be the smell then" and wanders off into the side bar.

Once I was at a beer festival with my Dad, when we bump into Micheal, he and Dad, start talking about foot ball and different beers, then half way through a sentence, Micheal trails off and looks into the distance just past my dad's head and states, "Yes well, craaaaabs, I could be doing without them in my life at the moment" and walks off.
(Madlyinsane, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 16:06, 1 reply)

Leaving the sports centre this week
after a game of squash, my friend M and I walked past a middle aged black lady, who said in a southern African accent "The cleaning continues. Shall I wash your Tutu*?"

She wasn't looking at us when she said it, although we were the only people within 20 feet, so myself and M exchanged bemused glances and ducked out a doorway, whereupon we burst out into uncontrollable giggles.

* We didn't take her up on the offer as my tutu was already at the cleaners. Length? It's like a ruffled miniskirt!
(Stu Moo winner of five nobble piece prizes, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 15:44, 2 replies)

Well, last night (Halloween)
Seemed to bring out the transvestite in 50% of the male population of my workplace.

There was even a transvestite midget!
( Methylene Blue - electrohead, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 15:31, Reply)

I'm surrounded by strange folk
Ive been surrounded by eccentrics for so long I rarely even notice anymore.
But this QOTW has made me think perhaps I would move if it wasnt for the fact I feel rather sane in comparison.
The orthodox priest who never washes his robes, every week they seem to get more encrusted with food stains.
The guy who only ever wears a sarong tied round his waist, nothing else, not even shoes. Sometimes he will slap on a ginger wig.
The holy man swathed head to foot in white, long dreadlock dangling from under the turban.
One day he and a transvestite got into a punch up over the attentions of a crystal healer.
That was good entrtainment.
The guy everyone calls Mr Mad, cycles everywhere treating everyone to fine displays of tourettes, he is quite a sweetie actually, but scares the hell out of the tourists.
The busker who cant sing or play his guitar but tries anyway, have heard rumours he has won awards for being the worst busker in the SW.
The guy who sits outside the church with a toy mobile phone having very loud conversations.
The woman who will only wear the colour brown.
The woman who chalks rants againt various authorities on the pavements.
The woman who keeps a starling in her handbag.

Makes going out shopping interesting sometimes :)

Somebody somewhere will perhaps talk about me as the woman who gives out bags of choccies to people in the street at Xmas.
Whatever this town has Its rubbing off on me ;)
(insomniac-surfer oh go on then, just this once, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 14:07, 2 replies)

Where does eccentricity stop,
and fucking madness begin? Money I guess.
Some people living near me just aren't off the wall,they built it.

Alcoholic Tourettes man. Pissed out of his brain constantly, shuffles round screaming "Fucking cunt" at peeps. Everyone knows him, so he's never been twatted.

Crap busker. Can't sing or play the guitar, just stands around Market Street, bangs the front of the guitar and shouts. For some reason he still gets given money. Serious mental problems.

My neighbour. Jehovahs Witness. Still insists on giving me tracts and Bibles, even though I've told him I'm not at all interested. 10 odd years down the line he's still doing it.

His brother. State of the art camera gear, and stands outside mine taking THE SAME BASTARD PHOTO that he's been taking ever since I've moved here. I've had Old Bill round mine a few times, thinking I'm the person that women have been complaining about, being a Peeping Tom.

Fucking hatstand the lot of them.
(Bear Pookie The Frankly Challenged. Halloween is coming to town., Sat 1 Nov 2008, 13:30, 4 replies)

On my estate...
... I greeted my neighbour, the friendly walking frame/ghetto blaster man, and warily spotted another, the black tranny/pimp with his girlfriend-for-hire trotting along behind.

As I crossed the road I was nearly mown down by another neighbour, who was pedalling along furiously with another pushbike, disassembled but apparently complete, tied to his back.

Am I the only normal person here? I thought, as I continued on my way with both my dogs on one long length of rope and a rucksack full of assorted butcher scraps (pigs' ears and tails etc) for their tea.

Nah, not eccentric, just normal, all of us. Staying alive as best we can.
(Juan Quar is clinging to her front teeth on, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 13:03, 2 replies)

a comic from my brother (the picture is a link)


This is actually a real guy that my brother was friends with (the name is changed), and it's pretty accurate.
(apeloverage committed the vile act of onanism on, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 12:39, 2 replies)

The Bradford Monk
As most of the othere Bradfordians on this site will attest to in our little city we have a person known as the Bradford Monk. He is of indeterminate age and little is known about him. He just walks the streets of Braford and the surronding area, wearing monks robes and sandels, all year long. The odd things is he seems to have been around for ever, my ma says he was walking around when she was younger and he doesnt look any older.

bradfordmonk.blogspot.com/
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=N1Fz1W7lpV0

Sorry no horses or length joke.
(Kerell, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 11:37, 6 replies)

The Incredible Dancing Man
Paul, for that is his name, is apparently afflicted with epilepsy. Now, this is a tragic thing, but he has a very unusual way of trying to deal with it. He dances.

Now, this isn't ordinary dancing. This guy dances like some fucked up backing dancer from a 70's Top of the Pops style video. He does the shaky legs, caressing his whole body, the Napoleon Dynamite punch across his face. The whole shebang!

Not only does he dance most fantastically, but he has to dance when he feels a fit coming on or sometimes, it seems, when he just feels the urge. It has become a challenge in the Lansdown (his pub of choice) to see what song will set him off dancing. You can't wade in with Dancing Queen (although he does like that one) you've got to start off subtle, just something with a beat that starts him tapping his feet, then beating out time with his hands, than, before you know it, he's up in the middle of the pub, during lunchtime, giving it the funk chicken.

Incredible Dancing Man is a legend in sunny Lewes, so much so that I have started up a group stalking him in an effort to catologue his dance moves and preserve them for future generations. Here are a few choice examples for you lovely B3tans:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iQ7koThmxM&mode=related&search
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKQOuSuwNng

and my personal favourite, he passes on his gospel to a new generation (sorry, it's a facebook link, and now I feel all dirty)
www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2398354772#/video/video.php?v=7867509433&oid=2398354772
( monkeyboyalpha jumping on the bandwagon since, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 10:58, 1 reply)

Squirrel!
My Uncles are good guys, odd and crass, but all around decent men. The very first time I met them, I walked into their house as they're sitting on the computer declaring "fake, fake, fake, real, fake, real...." This happened routinely at their place, half the time they'd be looking at Indian artifacts and half the time it would be boobs.

What makes them eccentric though, is their war with the squirrels. They have a neat little garden patch in the back yard and every time they turned their back, the squirrels would devour their tomatoes. So, in an attempt to permanently solve the problem, they decided to eliminate the squirrels. They went about this by sprinkling bird food over a grassy patch of yard. Then they dragged the hose over and let it run so that their grass was now a lovely mud puddle. Finally, they ran an extension cord from the kitchen plug out into the yard and plugged it into the ground - smack in the middle of the mud puddle. I've never seen them actually harm a squirrel, but I can't count how many times they've knocked over a beer or twelve running from the living room to plug in the extension cord because someone yelled "squirrel!"
(CaffeineFiend, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 6:07, Reply)

My girlfriend
will not and cannot sleep unless she has first washed the bedroom floor, with a tiny flannel, by hand. She also brushes her teeth twice, once with honey and then with toothpaste.
(Ol' Ginger Bastard a role model for the children, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 5:26, 9 replies)

James Brown
Well, not THE James Brown, but a much skinnier lookalike that dresses in a very similar way, and sticks out in my small English town like the jive-talking expatriate sore thumb he clearly is.

He would have a top-flight strut going on were it not for the fact that something is obviously wrong with his left knee, so his unbending leg flails in an elliptical orbit at roughly a 35 degree angle out from his body.

One day, I spotted him out and about, slowly quarter-cartwheeling his way towards the bus stop. He was clearly in a world of his own, as he barely registered the unfortunate 7-year old in the path of his whirling limb, and clocked him in the solar plexus. The kid looked utterly confused and shocked, as JB snapped out of his reverie, and fixing him with a glare, bawled "y'all best be MOVING when I'm on rambling time, motherFUCKER!". Then, all that was left to be observed was the sight of the angry mother swooping in from nowhere, and smacking JB upside his head with a Lidl bag.

It was an ace little sideshow.
( the_other_jeff_lebowski Croutons on my tits, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 3:10, 7 replies)

This QOTW
is crap.
(leglesss let that be a lesson to you, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 2:52, 6 replies)

Hm...
After looking up the dictionary definition of eccentric, it would seem that I am the one bearing the unfortunate label. I regularly confound (and perhaps annoy) my family with occasional ramblings and tendency to spout anti-religious rhetoric (my family being faithful catholics), I make friends with people one would consider geeky, those opposite to that and a great many inbetween, and I find I fit in none of these groups, as I care neither for getting wasted and soap operas nor computers and anime (I know I'm stereotyping vastly here, but I hope you get what I mean).

I'm afraid to say I can't think of many valid examples to justify this claim, unless enjoying the sensation of lemon juice stinging the eyes counts... Perhaps the claim that party rings go well with mild salsa dip (honestly, try it)? No? Ok.
(Impuritan, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 2:36, Reply)

Mad Frank
Oh Mad, Mad Frank!
I was Mad Frank's 'supervisor' at the local community centre. I use 'supervisor' loosely as I was the lowest office temp myself so it says something about Frank.
Mad Frank would turn up for work every day, shirt tucked in, tie straight, shirt CLEAN. At the end of a day, well half day actually because he couldn't really cope in the world of employment, of filing everything in the wrong place and making everyone battery-acid tasting coffee, his shirt would be untucked, tie lost somewhere, dubious stains down the front. The amount of times I had to go back to the archived files and sort out his alphabetical filing mistakes...

I was quite fond of Frank, so don't get me wrong here. But he was absolutely crackers! He was convinced that the police regularly broke into his flat to read his computer files and tap his phone. He also claimed to know the location of a secret police HQ in the area, because he himself was an ex-member of the service, but had to leave for 'personal reasons'. He asked me once if the actual body of the computer should be dusty inside, because his was spick and span clean, suggesting someone had been there to take the hard drive away and have a good snoop.

Once Frank rang me at work to say he would be late and for my sins I said 'Did you hear that, Frank?'
Frank: What?
Me: I don't know, a click or something on the line...

This totally fed into his conspiracy theory and he never gave up that train of thought, pestering me endlessly for what I heard. Oh, I was so bad to have done that! This conspiracy theory was added to by his claim that Charles Saatchi's post was once delivered to his flat - all of his post. So Frank packed off a whole sack load of this 'post' and had it redelivered, retaining the postal receipt.

Which he kept. For his art show. Which consisted of a multitude of pictures of Tony Blair with a pair of women's lips cut from fashion magazines stuck on. Or men wearing leopard print trousers with female model heads on top. And - a hand drawn self-portait of Frank staring out of his letter box with a copy of his Royal Mail delivery note to Charles Saatchi glued on. There was also a visual representation of the night his neighbour started banging on his front door, and Mad Frank just didn't know what to do...because he was naked....and he just didn't know what to do...but he wanted to open the door...but what to do...he was naked!!

The best thing was, to advertise his exhibition, Mad Frank left a coded message in the local newspaper with the co-ordinates of the location! I've kept the advert, it's around somewhere. Mad Frank also had his own political party.

He always wanted to try so hard at everything, he just never quite made it.
(Rosemarysbaby, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 2:00, Reply)

stan, stan, the dog-shagger man
stan is a very odd man. his head is beetroot-red and almost entirely spherical. he is a staunch protestant and, as such, looks forward to the 12th of july more than any other day of the year. he has a bizarre habit of immediately repeating anything he's just said. any time i've seen him, the first thing he will say is "looking forward to the 12th? looking forward to the 12th?"
if he sees someone he knows, he'll shout "alright mate, alright mate!"
i don't know if that's eccentric, but it's definitely annoying and a bit creepy.

oh, and he was caught in the entry behind my local, shagging his alsation.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Sat 1 Nov 2008, 1:54, Reply)

My mum
Pretty normal as mums go except when she couldn't sleep she would go out into the back yard and kill slugs.

We had a bit of a slug infestation so I used to think it was perfectly rational to go out at 1am in a nightgown and a tin of salt to melt inverebrates. I don't know if she found it relaxing or she had some sort of secret war raging with our slimy intruders that kept her up. She never used any other method to control them and we didn't even grow any vegetables FFS.

I've never asked about it, but everytime I see a slug I feel a pang of sympathy for the holocaust that took place for about 8 years in our back yard.
(Bo Nidle Coming back in from the cold., Fri 31 Oct 2008, 23:15, 2 replies)

Council Nutters, part 2
Keith

Keith was every accounting stereotype rolled into one. He had clearly halted every aspect of his development (except that which related to cost codes) at age 12. He wore a grey suit that was clearly designed for a teenager (a Mr. Byrite "My First Court Appearance" type affair, circa 1979), which showed us rather more of his shins and calves (and the grey socks with coloured stripes at the top that may well have dated back to the Winter of Discontent) than any human being could reasonably be expected to tolerate, as well as treating us all to the way his belly protruded from a jacket that clearly hadn't been buttoned up since Emerson Lake and Palmer were at #1. His hair, of course, was styled in the classic Grange Hill side parting, which is particularly appealing with silvering yet greasy hair.

Keith walked with a wobbly gait and spoke with a spittle-throwing slobber. And his chosen topic of conversation was accounting. Not finance, not the latest happenings in tax law (that would have been almost interesting), but the minutiae of subjective and objective project codes, cost transfers, and recharging. Keith found all this fascinating, and would write us long, incomprehensible emails whenever we did something wrong, which, considering that his definition of "doing something wrong" included using lower-case when filling out timesheets and using the wrong font on expense claims, was often. Not once did we ever take any actions as the result of a "Keith-a-Gram", but the boss's PA printed out some of the best ones and made an incomprehensible yet charming collage out of them.

On no account should you ever, ever, ask Keith a question related to accounting. Because he will give you an answer. An answer that could last over an hour, by which time those not equipped with a snorkel would have drowned in a sea of accountant-spittle (and believe me, compared to other methods of local-government related death, such as fossilizing at your desk or getting impaled on a traffic cone, is a good way to go), during which you learned exactly two things:

1) Local Government accountancy makes counting the hairs on your arm look interesting
2) No matter how bad your life gets, you will never stoop so low as to be a local government accountant, even if you have to gargle battery acid for a living to avoid it.

Our office once paid host to a new temp, a cocky Aussie kid on his first proper job (if you can call temping in a council office a proper job) after leaving uni. The guy clearly thought he knew everything and was in need of taking down a peg or two. So, one of the more experienced temps in the office (an evil-minded Kiwi called Steve, who hated this guy even more than the rest of us) suggested that he ask Keith to come to his desk and explain the Council's accounting system to him, on the grounds that "it will help your understanding of how Local Government works".

52 minutes later (we timed it), a shellshocked Aussie temp did indeed have an enhanced undertanding of what working for the Council involved. So enhanced was his understanding that he quit two days later.

When your personality is used by third parties as a biological weapon, it's time to re-evaluate your life.
(Axeman Jim, Fri 31 Oct 2008, 21:55, 1 reply)

M'landlady
I am the lodger in a house shared with my eccentric landlady.
She collects things:
Fridges: There are 3 fridges in the kitchen.
Filing cabinets: There are 5, also in the kitchen.
Limescale: Every few weeks, she empties the washing machine fluff filter, collects and saves the limescale.
Milk bottle tops: There are hundreds of these.
Toothbrushes: Hundreds, maybe thousands of toothbrushes all over the house. Some old, some new.
Bicycles: She has 4 bicycles. A couple work.
Dead things: There are several dead moths in test tubes inside the fridge. There is also a dead kestrel in a bag in the freezer.
There is a dead snake on top of one of the filing cabinets.
Oh, there might be a dead starling somewhere too, unless it escaped.
One night I got home to find a seagull wandering about on the ground floor. There was a big (seagull shit covered) note with "BEWARE -SEAGULL" written on it.
The next morning, I heard loads of banging and crashing above my room. The seagull had learnt to do stairs. Pretty much everything in the house was shat on and upturned.
Eventually m'landlady returned and let it back into the wild.
She's very odd, but really lovely too. -Incredibly kind and great company! And she puts up with my odd ways too.
(Rumpig, Fri 31 Oct 2008, 21:36, 1 reply)